Last night, WQAD presented News 8 at 10 without commercial interruption.  It was 35 minutes of news, weather and sports without a break from 10:00 to 10:35, roughly.  A huge pat on the back goes to producer Lee Ann Watson for putting together an interesting newscast that presented quite a producing challenge.  Well done, Lee Ann!

Last week, our Internet Content Manager posted the announcement of the break-less newscast on our facebook page.  One of our viewers had this to say:

I don’t get the value in that. I could appreciate fewer commercials, for sure, especially if it meant that the newscast was shortened. But unless there is some important breaking news, it’s going to be 30 minutes of fluff and 5 minutes of weather.

Wow.  Pessimistic much?

I took some offense at this comment and remembered it well looking at Lee Ann’s rundown for last night’s newscast.  I was so impressed to see that Lee Ann had 19 minutes of “real” news without anything that could be considered fluff.  At 19 minutes, she included an interesting story about a Chicago man getting revenge on a snow shovel thief.  The video is viral and, therefore, it’s easily argued that the story is not fluff.  However, I can see how some (like the pessimistic commenter, perhaps) might label it as such.  Regardless, it didn’t air until 19 minutes into the newscast!  And, it was followed by weather and sports and no more fluff stuff!

So, 30 minutes of fluff and 5 minutes of weather?  Nope!  Way to go, Lee Ann!

Posted: February 8th, 2011 under Behind the Scenes, News 8 at 10.
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